Ostkrieg (46 page)

Hunger! Russian women carve a dead horse for food, February 1942. BA Bild 183-B15171.

The fierce fighting of the winter is clearly evident from this photograph of the Kholm pocket, where Germans have stacked dead Red Army soldiers to form a protective wall, early 1942. BA Bild 101I-004-3633-30A.

The spring
rasputitsa
turned western Russia into a sea of mud. A horse-drawn wagon struggles through deep mud near Kursk, March–April 1942. BA Bild 101I-289-1091-26.

The lack of a quick victory and the need for workers forced the Germans to resort to foreign workers. Here we see the deportation of forced laborers for the German armaments industry, Artemovsk, Ukraine, May 1942. BA Bild 183-B19867.

The decision to use Ostarbeiter in German industry doomed Jews to a different fate. Deportation of Jews to an extermination camp (probably summer 1942). BA Bild 183-68431-0005.1942.

The second attempt at a blitzkrieg triumph. A panzer commander on the Don-Stalingrad front surveys the situation as his forces seem swallowed by the vastness of the steppe, July 1942. BA Bild 101I-218-0510-22.

German infantry on the march in southern Russia, August–September 1942. BA Bild 101I-217-0465-36.

Stalingrad: A German captain takes cover in the debris of the Barrikady artillery factory, October 1942. BA Bild 116-168-618.

Stalingrad: The nerve-wracking nature of house-to-house fighting is illustrated as German soldiers with an MG 34 machine gun and rifles anxiously peer out the window of a building, autumn 1942. BA Bild 101I-617-2571-04.

Stalingrad: German soldiers patrol in a destroyed industrial area, autumn 1942. BA Bild 116-1974-107-66.

Stalingrad: The swastika flies bravely from the ruins of the department store in whose cellar Paulus had his headquarters, October 1942. BA Bild 183-B22531.

Stalingrad: The face of an exhausted Landser after storming the Barrikady artillery factory, November 1942. BA Bild 183-R1222-501.

Executed Soviet partisans, 20 January 1943. The sign at the top says, “We are bandits; we have not only murdered and plundered German soldiers but also Russian citizens.” The sign at the bottom reads, “Photography prohibited!” BA Bild 101I-031-2436-05A.